


Skinned Knees

by ziskandra



Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Double Drabble Series, Gen, Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:42:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25219453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ziskandra/pseuds/ziskandra
Summary: Loghain hates Denerim, but Anora flourishes.Loghain and his daughter throughout the years, from her infancy to the Landsmeet.
Relationships: Anora Mac Tir & Loghain Mac Tir, Celia Mac Tir/Loghain Mac Tir
Comments: 7
Kudos: 14
Collections: Multifandom Drabble 2020





	Skinned Knees

**Author's Note:**

  * For [inquisitor_tohru](https://archiveofourown.org/users/inquisitor_tohru/gifts).



**1.**

When his newborn daughter cries in the middle of the night, it is Loghain that wakes to attend to her. Anora’s face is wrinkled into a wordless wail, tiny fists and tiny feet beating the air to an unfamiliar tune. Loghain presses the babe to his chest, revels in the heat of skin against skin. He places a feather-soft kiss against the light dusting of curls atop her head and inhales deeply.

She is so soft.

She is so small.

She is so beautiful.

She is so -- _oh._

A foul yet familiar odour is now wafting towards his nostrils. Loghain is affronted by Anora’s expression of faint surprise.

“Here? Really? Now?” he grumbles, all the while busying himself with wiping her down, cleaning her up and changing her cloths. Anora promptly stops crying, instead gurgling with an impressive amount of self-satisfaction for an infant so young. He swaddles her again and cradles her in his arms, the span of his fingers wider than the breadth of her shoulders.

For a moment he thinks she has fallen asleep, but then her lips start moving in a suckling motion.

She’s hungry.

It looks like he’ll have to wake Celia after all.

**2.  
  
**

Loghain is sitting at his desk answering some correspondence from the king when the door to his study slams open and he is jumping to his feet. There must be some sort of emergency, for no-one would otherwise disturb him while he is working.

No-one, that is, other than his three-year-old daughter, barefoot and covered in mud from the knees down, streaks of dirt on her face and in her hair, braids unfurling with loosened ribbons.

Anora plants her hands on her hips and inhales deeply. Now, where had he seen that expression before…?  
  
“Daddy,” she starts, and Loghain wonders, not for the first time, how the voice of someone so small can be quite so tremulous. “The boys were being mean—”

The remainder of Anora’s complaint is interrupted as Celia rushes into the room behind her, embracing their errant child between her arms. “Anora,” she admonishes, “what did I tell you about disturbing your father while he’s working?”  
  
Anora pouts. “He doesn’t mind,” she insists, looking at him imploringly with her big blue eyes.

How could he possibly say no to her?

Loghain sighs, rubs at the bridge of his nose.

“Come here, pup.”

His daughter happily obliges.

**3.**

By the time she’s six, it’s clear Anora will never fit in with the other children. And the older she gets, it’s obvious she has no intention of blunting herself in order to fit in. “She’s stubborn like her father,” Celia tells him, but if anything, it’s her mother’s fierce independence she’s inherited.

Perhaps the truth is simpler: she is a perfect combination of the best and worst parts of them both.

“Are you listening to anything I tell you?” Celia asks with mild exasperation, and Loghain refocuses to better listen to his wife. “She challenged a ten-year-old boy to a duel!”

“Yes,” Loghain answers slowly. “And she _won.”_ It’s what he would expect from his daughter, who has already taken an interest in swordplay, even if her practice weapon is little more than a wooden stick.

“ _Loghain.”_

His brow furrows in mock confusion. “Should I not be proud of her? Had she lost, I would talk to her about picking more appropriate opponents…”

“You idiot man,” Celia sighs, throwing her hands in the air, but Loghain is prepared with his favourite comeback.

With a maddening grin, he answers, “You said yes.”

In response, his wife kisses him soundly.

**4.**

“I missed you,” Anora admits as she nestles in front of him. His fingers always feel so clumsy when he braids his daughter’s hair. She’s usually not this chatty, however, unless he’s pulling too hard.

This is their second trip to Denerim together, and he’s getting better at this, he thinks.

“What do you mean?” he asks, focusing on threading the strands: under then over then under again.

“When you went to Denerim without me,” she answers, tucking her legs underneath her, knees scabbed from a recent misadventure.

The braid is done; his free hand fumbles for some pins in attempt to keep the hairstyle in place. “This wasn’t your mother’s idea,” he starts slowly, uncertain of where Anora was going with this line of conversation.

“I’m _nine_ ,” Anora emphasises with all the folly of youth. “And I’ve heard… “ She lapses into momentary silence, but regroups herself before too long. “I’ve heard Cailan and I are to be betrothed.”

The arrangement had not been finalised but that hadn’t stopped the rumours from spreading. He owes his daughter the truth. “Yes,” he answers simply.  
  
Anora’s jaw sets with renewed resolution. “Then I will have to learn to be a Queen.”

**5.**

His daughter is twelve and she is growing up so fast. Faster than he would like. No longer does she get into scraps with any young lad that looks at her the wrong way, no longer does she seek his comfort with skinned knees and bruised elbows.

Lately, she’s even asked him to stop braiding her hair.

He misses it, the quiet conversation, the shared silences, of feeling important and necessary in his daughter’s day-to-day life. Now she has tutors for every possible subject under the sun and Loghain is torn between the conflicting desires of wanting the best possible life for his daughter and wishing for a simpler life for them both.

Curse the day that Maric had ever elevated him above his station! Had the King really done Loghain a favour, or had he simply used him as another pawn?  
  
Loghain would never understand politics.

But Anora would.

Loghain hates Denerim, but Anora flourishes. He’s never seen his daughter so in her element without a sword in her hand.

Anora is growing up so fast, but there is nothing he can do to stop it.

One day, she might not need him. Not for anything at all.

**6.**

“Put me down!” Anora shrieks.

From the window of his office, Loghain sees an amusing role-reversal happening down in the courtyard of the palace. Cailan has hoisted Anora over his shoulder in a surprisingly secure hold. The children are at that curious age where it is evident how more quickly girls grow than boys. Anora is three years Cailan’s senior, and at fifteen, stands a head above her future husband.

A crowd is starting to gather, and if Loghain is to hear about this incident from Anora at all, he suspects the word _inappropriate_ will be at the forefront of her complaint. It takes Loghain a moment to realise that Anora is not wearing one of her usual gowns but rather a pair of riding breeches.  
  
Cailan sets Anora down on one of the horses, prepared and saddled and ready for adventure. “See,” he bellows, voice ringing clearly through Loghian’s opened window. “Told you I could carry you.”  
  
Anora settles herself on her horse, glaring at Cailan. “You didn’t have to prove it.” Her voice is softer than the boy’s and it takes Loghain a moment to realise she is more amused than angry.

He‘s glad they’re getting along.

**7.**

“I don’t love him,” Anora admits as they walk along the parapets, a rare stolen moment of solitude in between their busy schedules. “Is it necessary,” she continues, staring out over the city’s expanse, “for a successful marriage?”  
  
“You are only eighteen. It is still some years away,” Loghain starts, but Anora whirls on the spot, staring at him shrewdly.

“And you’re avoiding the question, Father!” Her hands ball into fists as though she has half a mind to strike him, but she has been taught better. If anything, it is mostly Loghain she feels free to lose her temper with like this.

Oh, what a lucky man he is.

He considers his words carefully. “It is a political marriage. It is not necessary to love him. You like him well enough, don’t you?”  
  
Anora rolls her eyes. “So when the time comes, what is it you suggest? I simply lie back and think of Ferleden?”  
  
Loghain blanches. He had not been envisioning anything so crass, yet he must admit Anora has a point. He lays a hand on her shoulder.  
  
“You will find a way to do what you must.”

Just like he had, albeit in different circumstances.

**8.**

“You were missing for nine days,” Loghain snaps, voice taut and muscles tense. Anora stares at him from across the table with not an iota of contrition upon her face.

She reaches towards the middle of the table for a piece of bread. It takes all of Loghain’s self-control to not slap it out of her hand. “I thought you would be happy for me,” she says, buttering her roll with practiced dignity. “Cailan is not so bad, actually, I have taken your advice and grown to love him in my own way.”  
  
It had been three years since their conversation on the parapets, but Loghain still remembers it clearly. He raises his eyebrows. Anora continues. 

“He’s very skilled with his sword.” There’s just a hint of innuendo to her words that Loghain gracefully ignores. Any other decision only leads to despair. “Besides, West Hill is now free of giants. Is it not the role of a future monarch to take care of one’s constituents?”

Begrudgingly, he must admit she has a point. He falls silent, tearing at his own bread roll.

Anora finally looks distressed, but the moment soon passes. “You were _worried_!” 

Loghain simply grumbles in response.

**9.**

The fine material of Loghain’s formal clothes chafe against his skin. Oh, the silks are soft but they suffocate. He wishes he could wear his leathers or his armour instead, two different sets of uniform that fit him like a glove.

Celia rushes out of Anora’s chambers, harried and out of breath. “Loghain. I need your help.”

He nods silently, accepting direction. As Celia closes the door behind him, he hears a sniffle from his daughter’s chair.

She’s crying. 

Protective instinct surges in Loghain. His daughter may be twenty-four but he is still her father. He strides over, places a hand on her shoulder, and finds himself at a loss as to what to say. Eventually, he murmurs, “Chin up, pup.”  
  
Anora laughs through her tears. Her hands are shaking. “I should have been a cabinetmaker.”  
  
Loghain laughs too at the unexpected comment. His hand moves from her shoulders, plays with the loose strands of her hair, muscle memory forming familiar braids. “You would have made an excellent cabinetmaker, but you will be an even better Queen.”  
  
She leans back in her chair, consoled by his words. “I hope I can be half the leader you are one day.”

**10.**

Loghain is on his knees in front of the Landsmeet, head hung low in defeat. He had fought and fought for his country, but it is not enough. He expects to be executed for his crimes; Maker knows he has made more than enough judgements when it comes to the fate of other men.  
  
It is nothing more or less than what he deserves.  
  
He does not expect his daughter to come to his defense, not when his actions have undermined her rule as Queen, not when she, too, had worked so long and fought so hard to be where she is today. She doesn’t need to stop the Warden, or Maric’s bastard, from swinging down their blades, and yet the relief is palpable in her eyes as it is agreed that Loghain will undertake the Joining. Alistair and Anora will marry, and his daughter will continue to be what he always knew she would be: the rightful Queen of Ferelden.

Anora doesn’t need him any longer. Today, it is him that falls upon her mercy. The thought should fill him with sadness but it instead fills him with pride.

What more could a father want for his daughter?


End file.
